


Lost and Found

by Wreybies



Category: Stargate Universe
Genre: Friends to Lovers, Il n'y a pas de smut, Lots of feelings tho, M for Language Only, M/M, No Smut, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-07
Updated: 2018-03-07
Packaged: 2019-03-28 06:12:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13897986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wreybies/pseuds/Wreybies
Summary: The Destiny reaches the next galaxy.  It's not the worst case scenario, but it's certainly not the best either.Set after S02E20"T" for Language Only.  No smut.  Smutless.  Il n'y a pas de smut.





	Lost and Found

   “Stop whinging, Eli. It doesn’t serve any purpose.” Dr. Rush poured over his screen on the control deck. “Just check to see that the gate is active on the planet. Concentrate on what you’re doing.”

   Eli was equally intent on his own screen. Anything to keep from looking anyone in the eye. “There’s been no contact from Earth, and if the ship records are accurate…” 

   “They’re accurate, Eli. We both checked them.” Rush had an amazing ability to go right for the ugly without even a pause for hope.

   “ _If_ the ship records are accurate, then it’s been…”

   “One thousand - seven hundred - and twenty three years.” 

   It hung there like a tumor. A death sentence. There wasn’t enough air in the room. Eli ran out of the control deck rather than let Rush see him cry. 

   “Eli! Come back here!”

* * *

   “Why are you blaming yourself?” asked Dr. Volker as they went through the stores. It was exactly what they expected. Everything perishable was either dust or dried stains in the bottoms of containers.

   Sometimes Eli wanted to choke Dr. Volker for being so nice.

   “My calculations were wrong. I fucked it up. We’re fucked.” Eli imagined he could press himself through the bulkhead and out into space.

   “You didn’t fuck anything up. You didn’t _do_ this _to_ us. You saw the records. There were energy drains that no one could have foreseen. No one.” Yes, Volker’s incessant niceness was infuriating. 

   “Everyone’s dead.My mom…” Eli’s core system froze up. His motherboard burned out. His graphic interface blew sideways. The only thing that worked was his audio card and it wailed. 

   Dr. Volker, thankfully, finally, had the good sense to leave him alone.

* * *

   And - of course - it was Matthew’s turn in this merry-go-round of people trying to console Eli. He leaned into the doorway of Eli’s makeshift room. “So, we’re gonna’ go planet-side and look for food.Wanna’ come?”

   “If I say yes, will everyone stop treating me like I’m on a suicide watch?” 

   “Maybe.”

   Not the answer Eli was expecting.

   “So I _am_ on a suicide watch.”

   “Dude, you screamed at Col. Young to go fuck himself and then Chloe found you sobbing on the floor in a corridor and couldn’t get you to respond.Can you blame us?”

   “Fine, but did you _have_ to sedate me?” Eli massaged his drug induced headache.

   “Uh, yeah. Kinda’.” Matthew pointed to his bruised left eye. “You throw a mean punch, Eli.Wasn’t expecting that.”

   “I’m really sorry about that, Matt. What do you think Col. Young is going to do?” Eli asked.

   “He ordered me to make sure you come on this expedition and to keep an eye on you.”

   “What, you’re gonna’ leave me on the planet? That’s fine. I deserve it.”

   “Dude, stop. He’s not pissed at you. He’s really, really worried about you. We all are, if you haven’t noticed.” Matthew placed a hand on Eli’s shoulder.

   “How do you not all hate me?”

   “Because you saved us?”

   “We are seventeen hundred years in the future. The communication stones don’t work so if Earth even still exists, they've completely forgotten about us. Seventeen hundred years is enough time for us to become mythological to anyone there now.” Eli stood and paced the small space of his bunk.

   “And everyone on this ship who went into those pods came back out alive and well. You _have_ noticed that shit _is_ really dangerous out here, right?”

   “Yes, but…”

   “Yes, but _nothing_. Take it from a guy who could teach classes in fucking up. We were never going to survive those drones. Never. The situation was shit and you found a way that at least gave us a chance. So it isn’t the win we were all hoping for, and yeah, it fucking hurts. It really hurts. But we have to _make_ it into a win somehow. That’s what being a soldier is. You take the shit and turn it into a win, no matter what.”

   “So, it’s like a shit-win sandwich.”

   “Yeah, exactly.” Matthew circumvented the sarcasm. “And you hope there’s enough win so you don’t taste the shit, but it doesn’t always turn out that way.” Matthew sighed through his nose. “So, are you coming or do I have to drag you?”

   “All right, all right. I’m coming.”

* * *

   “Hey, glad you joined us, Eli.” Dr. Volker and his neighborly smile approached the small team made of up Vanessa James, Matthew Scott, Camile Wray, TJ, Adam Brody, Ronald Greer, and surprisingly, Dr. Rush.

   “ _Oh, god…_ ” Eli groaned, barely audible.

   Greer and Matthew exchanged a grin.

   On the other side of the gate they exited into an early morning landscape. One the oddest landscapes Eli had ever seen, and he’d seen landscapes across three galaxies, including this one. 

   “Jesus,” said Greer. “Are those trees or bones?” In response, one of the ‘trees’ slowly lifted a limb and settled it down a few feet from it’s original position, leaned into the move and dragged the bulk of its ‘trunk’. “ _Fuuuuck_ me. That ain’t right.”

   TJ said, “Camile and Dr. Volker, you’re with me. Eli, you’re with Greer and Scott. Vanessa with Adam and Dr. Rush. Everyone has their sample bags. You know what to do. Maintain radio contact and meet back here in no less than an hour. Sooner if you find something interesting.”

   The groups headed in different direction. 

   About five minutes into the walk, with nothing that appeared to be remotely edible, Greer said, “Man, I hope we find something. It’s been what, two days now? I’m getting dizzy.” Greer’s disposition was solidly made of gunmetal, camouflage uniform, and soldierly confidence. It was oddly soothing to Eli. Greer was one of the only people who hadn’t tried to pet him or console him. Greer was always Greer.

   “No shit.How about you, Eli?” Mathew asked.

   “Yeah, I could eat,” Eli responded.

   A few minutes later, “So, what’s the deal with you and Dr. Volker?” asked Greer.

   “Deal?What deal?There’s no deal.” Eli stammered.

   “Then what was that _oh, god_ about?” Greer countered.

   Eli sighed dramatically. “It’s just… I mean… He’s always so _nice_. Nice, nice, nicety nice. Doesn’t it ever bug you?”

   Greer snorted a sarcastic laugh. “Oh, yeah, man.I hear you. He’s a fuck'n monster with all that nice. Want me to shoot him?”

   “It doesn’t bother you?” Eli winced at the whiney edge he heard in his own voice.

   “Maybe he’s just lonely, looking for company,” offered Matthew cryptically.

   “Now that you mention it, I don’t think I’ve seen him play a single round of barracks bingo yet,” Greer added. 

   “Barracks bingo?” Eli asked, though he had an idea what it meant.

   “Come on, Eli.” Matthew prodded.

   “Wait, you think…?” 

   “He’s not a bad guy, Eli. A person could do a lot worse,” Matthew said.

   "Yeah, but that doesn't mean I have to..."

   Greer cut in. "No, it certainly doesn't mean you _have to_...” He stopped and changed direction. “Have you ever had anyone flirt with you before?"

   "What?"

   "That's what I thought," Greer's lips skewed into a smug grin. "Under the best conditions people get flirting really wrong all the time. I'm gonna' go out on a limb here and say Dr. Volker doesn't have much practice himself. He's all up on you, tryin'a get your attention, and it's rubbing you the wrong way. But think about it, do you really dislike the man? I mean, compared to everything and everyone we deal with on the ship, is _Volker_ the bad guy, really?"

   Greer let Eli ruminate on the question. 

   "Why _now_?" Eli asked, dodging the original question.

   "Eli, you underestimate the value of having someone to hold you at night." Greer gave Eli a look as though he had just pronounced one of the great truths of the universe. 

   The radio squawked. It was Vanessa. “Unless you’ve got something better, everyone meet up half a kilometer north-northwest of the entry point. I think I’ve got something.”

   “Copy that,” said Greer into the radio. He pointed with expert assurance in the given direction and they changed course.

   They met up with Vanessa’s team in an area of large boulders covered in a thick red carpet of some kind of material. TJ was testing a sample. It cut like stretchy clay. “Okay.Not pretty, but I think it's safe.” 

   Greer sauntered over to the material and pulled a small piece off and popped it into his mouth. “Tastes like chicken.” He took out a collection bag and started filling it. “If chicken tasted like shit.”

   “Let’s fill the bags we have and go back for more. There’s plenty here,” TJ said, eyeing Greer reproachfully. Greer gave her a cheeky smile in return.

   As they collected, Eli noticed Dr. Volker eyeing him. Twice.He averted his eyes and concentrated on collecting whatever the red material was. Vanessa and Camille conversed on whether it was a plant or not and Brody gave a minor dissertation on how the divide between plant and animal was something that only made sense on Earth and even then there were lifeforms that blurred the line. 

   “Go talk to him, Eli. Don’t leave the poor guy hanging in the wind like that. I’m starting to feel sorry for him.” Matthew was enjoying the ribbing overly much.

   The heat in Eli’s cheeks was deafening. “Look, I’m not… I don’t think… I mean…” He didn’t know where he was going with this. 

   Rush was suddenly at Eli’s side, leaning in closely with uncharacteristic discretion, and with perfectly characteristic causticity said, “Grow up, Eli.It’s just sex.”

   Greer and Matthew each stifled a laugh with differing degrees of failure. 

* * *

   People still cried as they ate in the canteen. Three days hadn’t dulled the sharp edge of loss for most. Some people did manage to have normal conversations. Others dove into their work. Some hid in their quarters and unless they were needed no one bothered them. On Camille’s suggestion, Col. Young imposed a mandatory daily muster from the first day to make sure everyone remained accounted for. So far there had been no incidents.

   Eli left the canteen and headed in the direction of his bunk. What remained of his iPod was just the metal parts. Everything else had turned to dust. Thankfully, he had uploaded his music to the ship’s memory before he had managed to fix the chamber into which he had gone into cryostasis, so it wasn’t lost. The sound through his ship’s console wasn’t exactly hifi, but it was better than nothing. He listened to the tinny music and tried to clear his mind with little success.

   There was a knock at the entry to his room.It was Dr. Volker. 

   “Eli, can I talk to you?”

   Eli expelled a loud breath. Dr. Volker put his hands up in a gesture of _I come in peace_.

   Eli nodded him in and he sat on the bunk next to Eli. “I need to apologize to you. I’ve made you uncomfortable, and I’m sorry for that. I hope you can forgive me.”

   Eli didn’t say anything, scared to open his mouth. Scared of what he might say, might agree to. When the moment had stretched too long, Dr. Volker gave a pained expression and got up to leave.

   “Wait,” Eli said softly. And then, “Why me?”

   The tears that had welled in Volker’s eyes spilled. He sniffed loudly. “Does there have to be a reason? This is all really hard and my room is really empty and the nights are really long.” He shrugged. “I figured I would take a shot.I’m sorry if I offended you.”

   Eli realized his question had been misunderstood. “I’m not offended. That’s not what I meant. You’re a nice-looking guy. There are lot’s of guys on the ship that are much, _much_ more attractive than me.” 

   Dr. Volker sat back down. “I don’t want to say _I don’t care about that_ , because then that sounds like I’m agreeing with you that all those guys are better than you and I picked you anyway. Why _you_?Because why _not_ you?Why would you _not_ be wantable?You manage to be the smartest person I’ve ever met in my life without being an ass about it - unlike Rush. You’re funny, you’re sweet...” He shrugged again with just one shoulder.

   Eli blinked tears from his eyes. He took Dr. Volker’s hand in his, surprised at how soft and warm it was. Dr. Volker laced his fingers into Eli’s.

   “Okay,” said Eli.

   “Yeah?” asked Volker.

   “Yeah.  You have violet eyes.”

   “What?”

   “Your eyes, they’re violet. I didn’t think that was a real thing. Can we stay in your room tonight?” 

* * *

   The next morning in the canteen, over yet another serving of the red material that some of the crew had taken to calling _cookie dough_ , Eli sat across from Dr. Volker in comfortable silence. Greer walked by, stopped, and placed a jaunty “You’re welcome” into Eli’s ear and winked at Dr. Volker. Passing Matthew as he exited the canteen, Greer stuck out a hand and they exchanged a loud high five.

   “They know, don’t they,” said Dr. Volker.

   “Yeah, they were rooting for you.” Eli looked around and noticed several faces noticing them.

   “Really?” Volker asked, mildly astonished.

   Dr. Rush passed them with an empty tray in hand. “Everyone knows. Command deck in ten minutes, the two of you, assuming you lovebirds can tear yourselves away from each other’s eyes.”


End file.
